THE HORNE WITCH PROJECT
Kathy Evans
Witch, rock star, television celebrity and all-around It Girl - why is Fiona Horne so determined to be famous? By Kathy Evans
Trying to interview Fiona Horne is like trying to hail a taxi. Here we are, squashed in to a shadow on her patio three floors up and she's talking about witchcraft, churning out sentences in a relentless monotone at 90 miles an hour. Just when she pause for a breath, I seize my chance and leap in with a question but she swerves around it and, damn, she's off again.
The problem is that Horne, 34, is just back from a whirlwind tour of the UK promoting her compilation book, Witch - A Magickal Journey, and she's not yet jumped off the PR bandwagon. She's been casting spell on TV and radio from Birmingham to Belfast, no doubt in 10-minute time slots, and she's developed the fine art of self-promotion at double speed.
She never looks at me, not once, while we talk about there is something rather grim about the way she recites lines from her book in such a world-weary fashion. She sounds like a Victorian Sunday school pupil forced to learn the Ten Commandments by rote as she launches into the rules of Wicca: "Do what you want to do as long as you don't hurt anyone; do what you want to do as long as you don't interfere in another's free will", blah blah blah, counting them off on her fingers as she drones on.
I wonder if the passion she originally had for the occult as a teenager has been snuffed out by her celebrity status as Australia's most famous witch.
"I'm not really excited by books," she admits with a deep sigh. "One thing's for sure, I don't intend to churn out a book a year on witchcraft. The first time it was exciting, but now it's like, oh, another book."
That's quite an admission for someone who professed in her first publication, Witch - A Personal Journey: "All my life I'd wanted to be a writer - more than being a rock star, more than being anything," In fact, three books later, it seems that Horne is still unclear what she wants to be, other than famous.
At one point, she talks about launching herself as a solo artist and rattles on about her management overseas (the same as Kylie Minogue's) but then in the next breath, she's saying rather wistfully, "Know what I really want to be? A travel journalist."
To date, she's stuck her fingers in quite a few pies and pulled out the plum. Her first and second books are best sellers. Her former band Def FX released three albums, toured extensively in the US and supported the Smashing Pumpkins in Australia before breaking up in 1998. And her latest incarnation, as the hostess of Channel Nine's Party!, has been a triumph, too. The ratings did not go through the roof, but there's a second series planned for [this] year.
And yet right at this moment, she's not happy. She's exhausted from the UK book tour, emotionally drained and depleted and when I turned up at her modern apartment in St Kilda, it looked as if it had just been ransacked. Clothes, papers and books were strewn all over the floor like a partially finished mosaic.
She was obviously embarrassed about being caught unawares and erupted when she heard there was a photographer coming, too. "Absolutely no way, no way, I've not got any make-up on. I'm not ready," she fumes, hands on her hips, defiant. (This from the woman who posed for Playboy in a coffee shop draped in snakes. A naked body is OK, but a bare face is too revealing.) And then she's on the phone to her agent: 'why wasn't she told? Oh, she was? There's an e-mail?' She checks her laptop and there it is but it came too late... and so for 20 minutes we toss dates and times for the photos back and forth, this little triangle of me, Horne and the faceless agent.
Finally we find that "window" and adjourn to the balcony where we squash into a shaded bit on the bare concrete while St Kilda bakes and shimmers below. "The goals I set for myself tend to be so bloody sky high," she says jamming her baseball cap down further on her unmade - and beautiful - face. "I think if I'd grown up with a better sense of self-worth, I wouldn't have set such huge goals for myself. I work really hard - there are people who don't work as hard as I do yet make a lot more money. But I've had nothing, I've worked my arse off for everything. If I'd had a better sense of self-worth, I would have stayed at school and ended up being a marine biologist or an anthropologist. I would have realised what was going to make me, Fiona Horne, happy."
Surely what would have make her happy is to have been accepted as a child. She was adopted by her parents, Ken and Barbara, and grew up in Illawong, in Sydney's south-west, the eldest of three, but she felt she never fitted in. And no wonder. In her latest book, Life's A Witch, a sort of memoir-come-manual aimed at teenagers, she talks of being at a Christmas gathering, when she was 14, and a relative telling her: "Your mother will never love you as much as I love my children because you're not really hers. You're not really anyone's are you?"
She says her parents - straight-laced, middle-class Catholics - were of the "spare the rod and spoil the child" mentality. Her father would refuse to let her do something and then say "You don't need to know why - your opinion doesn't matter. Just do you're told"
Not surprisingly, her troubled relationship with her parents totally broke down as a teenager and she would cry herself to sleep. At 15, she left home and lived on the street for eight months around Kings Cross because "anything was better than being where I was." She doesn't like to talk about it now because it upsets her mother, except to say she's amazed that she's still alive to day with the situations she got herself into. "I remember one bloke... I was lucky to have got away from him."
At night, she drank with the transvestites and prostitutes in the bar at the Rex Hotel in Kings Cross. Today, the hotel's been rebuilt as a plush establishment geared towards Japanese tourists. Ironically, when she was appearing on Good News Week, Channel Ten would put her up there: "I'd be think how I'd come full circle. Nineteen years ago, I'd be downstairs tripping on acid and now I'm in a room where I turn on the telly and it says, 'Good Morning Miss Horne'. God, life's strange."
One of her many jobs at that time was as a paint sprayer with a panel-beating company, "because the boyfriend I had then was really into cars and I wanted him to like me." And she would catch the train to work in Homebush in her overalls. She also worked as a model and receptionist with a clothing company and then in a health food shop, studying naturopathy at night. She played guitar in a punk band called the Mothers on the weekend and then one day, she got a phone call from a guy called Sean that changed her life.
He asked her if she wanted to be in a techo-metal fusion band, which became Def FX. It was through the lyrics that she wrote ("It's not vicious, just delicious to be Witchy and pernicious, so don't be superstitious...") that she came out the broom closet, as she puts it.
Her experiences with the band was bittersweet, to say the least. As a teenager, she would fantasise about being a rock star, staring up at her poster of Debbie Harry and Siouxsie Sioux through eyes blurred with tears of yet another row.
And now, at 24, there she was, on the cusp of living her dream, free from her parents only to find herself trapped in a string of abusive relationships. One of which left her with a black eye and a cracked rib.
She shakes her head in disbelief when she reflects on it now: "It was awful... I just think 'why?' It's an illness. You think when you're in those relationships with men that your situation is so unique and they are such amazing people and if you don't get it wrong next time, you'll be OK but they change the rules of the game all the time."
Now, she says, "I think I've broken the chain. I've done a lot of spells to break the habit of attracting misogynist guys who are just wrong. You get convinced you are to blame for everything - my Mum always said that I wear my heart on my sleeve and let people take advantage of me. She says that's why I was easily lead as a child and did so many things. She always told me I needed to develop thicker skin."
While we are talking, her mobile rings - one of those crazy little tunes. As she answers it, her voice soften into a lilting cadence, totally different to the dull, fast monotone of the interview. "That was my Mum," she explains. "The biological one."
Horne left it until her 20s to find her biological parents because was frightened they would be "f***ed up" and she wanted to feel grounded enough to deal with it. Her birth mother is from East Germany and speaks with a guttural accent. Her father has Eastern European ancestry. Horne arrived shortly after the pair emigrated to Australia but the relationship didn't work out. She tries to see her mum, who lives in Brisbane, every year but doesn't see her father, who she says is a prominent figure in Sydney. "He needs his privacy to lead his own life and I respect that. He's very wealthy and prominent but I've never exploited or abused that. He had his family and he knows who I am. He asks after me... which I think is nice."
Meeting her "biologicals", as she calls them, was like discovering strands of herself. "It answered questions... like my Mum couldn't understand why I was so drawn to being a performer but it was interesting to find out that on one side, I come from a line of dancers and singers... the most bizarre thing was to see how much I look like my mother. She calls me her gorgeous girl which is nice."
But for Horne, her real parents are Ken and Barbara, to whom she dedicates her books, and for whom she shows an immense loyalty, despite her turbulent childhood.
In Life's A Witch she staunchly defends their methods of child-rearing and urges all young pagans to follow suit. "I know my parents were doing the best they knew how and that their own upbringing dictated how they raised me," she writes. Historically, as this has been the guise under which crimes against children have been accepted and excused, is she not just urging teenagers to continue the tradition?
"Look, I'm just trying to get people to feel good about themselves," she says. "A lot of people say the book is like a life skills handbook, anyway. I'm not trying to be glib and say that it's all good, just smile at the goddess every morning; it's about encouraging and understanding the difficult times in life. What I'm saying is you don't need to be overwhelmed by them. You can get through them. I mean, pretty full-on shit went down when I was a teen... what doesn't destroy you makes you strong."
She certainly looks strong. From the tilt of her jaw to the hard lines of her torso, etched in tattoos of mythological beasts, it is clear she goes to a gym. Casting spells to sort out your difficult parents and your boring love life may sound potty to the uninitiated but she claims it has given her an inner strength, which surely is the point of faith.
Though there is something rather fundamentalist about the way she constantly laments "if only I'd been a teen witch" (she didn't start practicing until she was 20) as if that would have been the panacea for dealing with the pain of her youth. But, of course, you cannot magic your way out of a miserable childhood. "I get jealous sometimes when I see children in happy homes," she wistfully confides. And then she braces herself: "Look, I'm not saying for a minute that my challenges even scratch the surface of what some children go through, or have experienced. Shit happens. We all make mistakes; we don't need to hold grudges. I get on really well with my parents now. We have a great relationship."
Time is running out. She's meeting a friend and she's still got the washing to sort out. I am downstairs in the kitchen, watching Fiona Horne, rock goddess, Playboy pin-up and witch, sorting out her smalls. She is infinitely warmer when she's not being interviewed and her voice ebbs and flows with expression. While she shoves a load in the tumble-dryer, she confesses to being clucky (she's just started dating Geelong Cats footballer Clint Bizzell). She's convinced she's going to have twins one day and call them Rhys and Rhiannon, both Celtic names.
Not that she has much time to be a parent, for it seems that Horne is omnipotent. She beams out of glossy magazines, she is the special guest on Melbourne's TTFM Morning Show with Richard Stubbs every Wednesday, offering spells to listeners to get them out of a tight spot.
A few months ago she appeared on Channel Nine's Who Wants To Be A Millionaire, and openly cursed herself for failing to know that Ottawa was the capital of Canada. Viewers were taken aback to see Horne, usually so glamorous and contained, show such anger at her slip-up. Now, she shrugs off the incident with a tight laugh: "Yeah, I was pretty pissed off because I've toured Canada with the band, and I should've known the capital, but it's like Canberra, I mean, how many people outside of Australia would realise that it's not Sydney?"
When she's not on television, or radio, she's out on the nightclub circuit, promoting Life's A Witch, brining witchcraft to the masses. With its right-on style and groovy chick vernacular (phrases like "I dig Jesus" are bound to set Archbishop George Pell's teeth on edge) she will find an adoring crowd among the hot and sweaty dance floor divas.
Before I leave, I ask her to show me her altar. In her book, she talks about the wicker-cane chest set up in her room, with the sun and moon candlesticks, the brass dagger with the handle carved into the shape of a mermaid, the glazed red pottery dish her mum made in a craft class and the chunk of amethyst crystal for psychic energy. I am hoping for a glimpse of her witchy garb, the black cape with the white fur trim or even the born-again pagan T-shirt she wears for a laugh but there is nothing in this duplo, which she shares with Neighbours actress Krista Vendy, to point to any form of alternative lifestyle. For someone who worships nature, there's no greenery whatsoever, not even a potted plant.
I wasn't expecting a bubbling cauldron but perhaps a lingering trace of incense or an aroma of drying herbs. No wind chimes jangling in the window breeze, no horned door-knockers, half-burnt candles and statues of deities on top of the telly. Just this urban mess of life-on-the-run and clothes drying on the backs of chairs. Even her two snakes, Sebastian and Lulu, are discreetly tucked away in little glass tanks against the wall. You wouldn't even know they were there, thank god.
She points somewhat apologetically to a half-opened sports bag, lying in the middle of the floor. "My altar's in there. I've not really unpacked yet since I got back from overseas."
And now she's ushering me to the door because she's going to be late. The price of her fame is that she can no longer catch public transport because people come and ask her for spells. And yet the Fiona Horne without the make-up in jeans and a baseball hat is hardly recognisable as the glamour queen we see on our screens (she's much better-looking in the flesh).
She's been accused of selling her soul, of using witchcraft to create her own stardom, which she strenuously denies, but then she's set up her own web site and produced a pastel coloured Wikid Witch Kit complete with CD, candles and body lotion with Red Earth founder Nick Chadwick. And she didn't have to write three books on the subject. However, they're still a good read because they are drafted with so much honestly and forthrightness. The eclectic mix of personal anecdote, wiccan legend and spell recipes keeps a beating pulse in what otherwise could be a dull read. She may have used witchcraft to promote herself but she writes about it with such passion and knowledge, it is clear her belief is genuine.
Her critics are angered by the commercial, homogenised Horne Witch Project but it can also be argued she has removed much of the fear and ignorance of a religion which has always been taboo. Not since Samantha twitched her nose is the cheesy sitcom Bewitched has the wacky world of Wicca seemed so suburban and benign. The past 12 months have been grueling, but as she says with a smile that is almost a grimace: "I'm not happy right this very minute but I know what I'm feeling is partial exhaustion. I'm really tired, inside I'm emotionally tired. But by the time this goes to print, I'll be fine and dandy, I'm sure."
Perhaps she sees something of herself in the story of the Great Warrior Witch Queen that she recounts in Witch - A Personal Journey. It has to be dark to see the stars.